s, viz. what their life and what their
manners were; through what men and by what measures, both in peace and
in war, their empire was acquired[7] and extended; then, as discipline
gradually declined, let him follow in his thoughts their morals, at
first as slightly giving way, anon how they sunk more and more, then
began to fall headlong, until he reaches the present times, when we can
neither endure our vices, nor their remedies. This it is which is
particularly salutary and profitable in the study of history, that you
behold instances of every variety of conduct displayed on a conspicuous
monument; that from thence you may select for yourself and for your
country that which you may imitate; thence _note_ what is shameful in
the undertaking, and shameful in the result, which you may avoid. But
either a fond partiality for the task I have undertaken deceives me, or
there never was any state either greater, or more moral, or richer in
good examples, nor one into which luxury and avarice made their entrance
so late, and where poverty and frugality were so much and so long
honoured; so that the less wealth there was, the less desire was there.
Of late, riches have introduced avarice, and excessive pleasures a
longing for them, amidst luxury and a passion for ruining ourselves and
destroying every thing else. But let complaints, which will not be
agreeable even then, when perhaps they will be also necessary, be kept
aloof at least from the first stage of commencing so great a work. We
should rather, if it was usual with us (historians) as it is with poets,
begin with good omens, vows and prayers to the gods and goddesses to
vouchsafe good success to our efforts in so arduous an undertaking.

[Footnote 1: "Employ myself to a useful purpose,"--_facere operae
pretium_, "to do a thing that is worth the trouble,"--"to employ oneself
to a good purpose."--See Scheller's Lat. Lexicon.]

[Footnote 2: "A practice,"--_rem_.--Some, as Baker, refer it to _res
populi R._ Others, as Stroth, to _res pop. Rom. perscribere_.]

[Footnote 3: "My share,"--_pro virili parte_, or, "to the best of my
ability."]

[Footnote 4: "Historians."--Those mentioned by Livy himself are Q.
Fabius Pictor, Valerius Antias, L. Piso, Q. AElius Tubero, C. Licinius
Macer, Coelius, Polybius, etc.]

[Footnote 5: "Hastening to these later times."--The history of the
recent civil wars would possess a more intense interest for the Romans
of the Augustan age.]

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